Maximilian Prüfer: Ein Bild findet Gnade (An Image is granted Mercy)

The Nazi book burnings are well known. Less widely known is that on March 20, 1939, paintings from German museums were also burned at the main fire station on Lindenstraße in Berlin. The exact circumstances remain not fully clarified to this day.

– Flypicture, Max Beckmann, Der Strand 1927, 2023-2025; fly traces with pigments derived from World War II bomb debris

Following extensive research, Maximilian Prüfer reconstructed a number of the works that were burned and lost at the time. He transferred their motifs onto paper and mounted it in specially constructed boxes. Within these boxes, he breeds flies, feeding them with pigments derived from the rubble of the Second World War. On the paper, warmed by sunlight, the insects gravitate toward the darker – because warmer – areas of the image. Through their traces, a picture emerges that is based on the original, yet is not a copy, but a delicate interpretation by a collective organism – no individual artistic hand, but a form of memory. The pigments from the rubble connect the images to the traces of war. Where the Nazis stood for control, Prüfer foregrounds a living process. Where they erased images, Prüfer creates remembrance. What matters is not only the finished work, but also the openness of the process, in which material, behavior, and historical reference converge. For Prüfer, these works constitute a form of new beginning. The flies function as a metaphor for transition and transformation – between life and death, erasure and memory. “No image is granted mercy,” Joseph Goebbels wrote in his diary. Prüfer inverts this cynical act. The title of his exhibition: “An Image Is Granted Mercy.”

Runtime: Sat, 25/04/2026 to Sat, 06/06/2026

Takes place here:

• Sexauer